The present disclosure relates beverage nanoemulsions md methods for making such beverage nanoemulsions. More particularly, the present disclosure relates to methods for making beverage nanoemulsions using high shear processing.
Beverage nanoemulsions are typically oil-in-water emulsions with particle sizes below 1 micron, i.e., d95<1 micron. These nanoemulsions comprise flavour or cloud oils, emulsifiers, water, and optionally preservatives. Levels of oil range between 6 and 10 wt % in the emulsion concentrate. Also a weight ratio of emulsifier to oil greater than 1:1 is used in combination with a target oil particle size of d95<1 micron to ensure physical stability in the beverage nanoemulsion and in the final beverage product.
The current manufacturing process for making these beverage nanoemulsions consists of two steps: (1) dispersing/dissolving the emulsifier in water, and then adding the cloud or flavor oil to form an emulsion premix in a mixing tank; emulsion particle sizes are typically d95>2 microns, needing further size reduction; (2) pumping the emulsion pre-mix formed in step (1) to a high pressure homogenizer (pressure between 3000 and 5000 psi) to break down the oil droplets to the target particle sizes (d95<1 micron). This two-step process is time consuming and energy intensive. Additionally, concentrated, viscous emulsions with less water cannot be produced with the current process. The high pressure homogenizers cannot handle concentrated, viscous emulsions due to their inherent design (small orifice of the homogenizer get clogged). Therefore, there is a need for alternative methods for making concentrated beverage nanoemulsions to address the limitations of the abovementioned process.